Post-chlorinated polyvinyl chloride (CPVC) is a thermoplastic resin or polymer that can be processed and formed into various useful articles by conventional techniques, such as milling, calendering, extruding, laminating, compression molding, transfer molding, and the like, but not with the ease desired in certain commercial applications, such as, for example, in pipe extrusion and calendering, unless additives or processing aids are incorporated therein to improve its stability and impact strength, as well as its processability. However, while improving processability, etc., these additives or processing aids produce other harmful effects, that is, the compositions are considerably softer, weaker and less desirable chemically and electrically than the original resin, thus limiting their field of usefulness in the manufacture of rigid plastic articles.
In general, the post chlorination of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) comprises forming a suspension of finely divided PVC particles in a major proportion of an aqueous medium which optionally contains about 5% to 25% by volume of a chlorohydrocarbon which functions as a swelling agent for the PVC particles or resin. The aqueous medium, or liquid reaction medium, is then saturated with chlorine gas at a temperature no greater than about 65.degree. C. and then photo-illuminating the suspension to induce the chlorination reaction between the dissolved chlorine and the suspended PVC. More chlorine gas is passed into the suspension so that there is always present an excess of dissolved chlorine. The chlorination reaction is terminated when the desired amount of chlorine has been reacted with the PVC by extinguishing the photo-illumination. Such a process is described in U.S. Pat. No. 2,996,489.
The chlorination rate in the above-described processes, that is, the aqueous PVC suspension process and the same with a chlorohydrocarbon swelling agent added thereto, can be increased by adding to the PVC suspension a catalytic amount of a free radical-producing agent, such as, for example, azo compounds, peroxy compounds, peroxides, nitroso compounds, redox catalysts, and the like. Also, in U.S. Pat. No. 3,167,535 there is described a method for increasing the reaction rate of the chlorination process by adding to the PVC suspension a catalytic amount of reducing agent, such as, for example, reducing sugars, aldehydes, alkali metal sulfides, metabisulfites, bisulfites, hydrosulfites, and the like. This increased chlorination rate produces a CPVC having increased stability against heat.
CPVC made by known processes, such as described above, suffers from a further detrimental effect which detracts from its usefulness in many finishing operations. Chlorinated polyvinyl chloride is susceptible to dehydrochlorination at its melt processing temperature. This degradation adversely affects the properties of finished articles made from CPVC compounds, such as loss of impact strength. Further, this undesirable degradation reaction is accelerated by trace contamination of heavy metals, which can easily result from hydrochloric acid attack on metal processing equipment. The observed result is that CPVC degradation usually starts at the polymer melt to metal interface during processing.
A detrimental effect which detracts from the usefulness of CPVC in many finishing operations is the use of many inorganic particulate fillers in making CPVC compounds which have a detrimental effect on the impact strength thereof. Obviously, there is a great need in the art to provide a means of increasing the impact strength and thermal stability of CPVC formulations during processing.